Unending World War
by eisceire
Summary: Even love can die in a war torn world but when it does vengeance is born.


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 **o0O¥O0o A/N o0O¥O0o**

 _ **Seems that we have an active plagiarist on Fan Fic Net robbing off fic from Deviantart net. I've a crop of fics on Devi. They're all done as story-per-day; some for Dalekweek & some not but all done with a superfast pen & no sense of sanity. They're getting posted over here as a safeguard; so any of my Lev Fics on Devi pre twenty-fifteen are likely gonna be repeats of Fan Fic Net. Just a hint in case you decide to visit me over there.**_

His Imperial Highness Aleksander Ferdinand-Chotek von Hapsburg-Hohenberg, Prince of Hohenberg, Emperor of the Amalgamated Austro-Hungarian Empire gazed around at his closest counsellors and confidantes; reflecting on all that had been achieved from the ending of the First Great War till now. He was proud of the peace and stability that had come about, so much of it by the efforts of himself and Midshipman Sharp; prouder still of the sanctuary he had made of his empire and proudest of all that he had made Deryn Sharp his wife. He owed so much to her. There were the palpable facts, the stuff of biographies, broadsheets and the bawdy press across the world: how being taken hostage by the young middy had saved all their lives in the mountains; the times she'd accompanied him into danger; the daring escapes and rescues she'd engineered for him; the Ottoman revolt they'd inspired and only survived by being by each other's side and so much more. Yes; it was inescapably true that there would be no Emperor Alek or Amalgamated Empire but for the efforts of one Dylan-Deryn Sharp. Much more than that though; Alek knew there could never have been such an emperor as him or an empire such as this had Sharp not been so much a part of his life. In truth, the well-laid schemes of Wildcount Volger and his own father could very well have seen him safe to the end of the First Great War and even seated him on an empire's throne at the end but only at the cost of immeasurably much more carnage and devastation and, to Alek's great shame, he knew that himself and the empire he ruled would have been little different to what had gone before ... if he had followed the path laid out for him by his aristocratic ancestors and allies.

There were times yet when he cringed at how sheltered and ignorant he'd once been: never reading a newspaper, not knowing what a potato was and so very self-absorbed that he'd once entirely overseen that he could be tracked through the crew that accompanied him. He owed so much to Sharp's astringent practicality for bringing him down to earth and taking his head out of the clouds; an ironic achievement for such a dedicated airhand as Sharp. Had she ever seen how much she'd changed the world by preventing him from being just another aristocratic addlepate? She'd give him the Common View, the ability to consider every strata of society and not be afraid to take good advice from anyone and be willing to make use of whoever could be of assistance to him.

In doing so he'd discovered other like-minded individuals whose concerns cut across national or partisan boundaries. Dr Barlow, for one, was more concerned with science and the state of the world than the interests of her native Britain and there were many of her fellow scientists who felt the same. All of them had found a home, here in his Empire, whether they were Clanker or Darwinist. Whatever about that, Alek still doubted if he'd have been so welcoming of the refugee Clanker scientists if Sharp hadn't driven the point home: "Don't be such a clart, they're just people who're out of luck, like you were when we took you onboard the Leviathan and looked how that turned out ... give them that much of a chance!" He had given them the chance, he'd trusted his liebchen through the storm of reprisals, restrictions and reparations that followed the humbling of the Clanker powers. He'd stood firm against fierce pressure from the Darwinist powers; knowing Sharp would be there whenever he wavered, whenever he wearied or doubted his own resolve.

Even now he couldn't help but marvel at the outcome of his liebchen's breadth of vision. Within his empire there had concentrated more of the scientific genius of the world than any other Great Power could come close to boasting of and not just scientists but thinkers and strategists too. To begin with it had been a wild melange of eccentricities all pursuing their own endeavours individually until an observation from his liebchen, in her own way as perspicacious as any lorii, shook them out of their idyll. "Yon Darwinist dafties are turning into right bullies" she'd observed "Good for them they came out on top but they shouldn't keep rubbing the Clankers' faces in it ... that's just fuel for another fight."

Looking back now, Alek saw that that was the moment he'd determined his empire had to be steered with a firmer hand. Being noble, he saw it in allegorical terms: as ruler it was his duty to keep his hands on the saunters that steered the machinery of the state but at his back, as ever, it was his liebchen who kept watch and guided him. It became policy to hold aloof from the entangling alliances that were binding all the Powers into a single house of cards where, if one fell, all the rest would come tumbling down too. Alongside that, Alek took under his wing all the smaller independencies between the Adriatic and the Black Sea. With the powerhouse of minds and materials at its disposal, the Empire far surpassed the established British standard of two-to-one superiority in battleships. More than that, it wasn't simply a numerical superiority but a superiority of technology and might. Unlike the Ottoman Empire, where machines where merely modelled after nature, the Amalgamated Empire combined Clanker and Darwinist technology into unified creations; the Clanker-engined Leviathan was but a crude forerunner of what was now produced ... fearsome creations such as fabricated airships mounted with Tesla cannon and powered by the attributes of the electric eel.

All of this made the Amalgamated Empire virtually unassailable, as the Powers splintered into factions and immolated themselves in the flames of a second world war. All of the Powers wooed the Amalgamated Empire, desperate for it to enter the fray on their particular side and tip the tide of battle inexorably in their direction. On the opposite side of the coin: these same Powers were most careful not to give offence to Alek's Empire as it was widely suspected that it was powerful enough that, should it choose so, it could overmaster every single one of the other Powers, especially now that they were weakened by warfare. Alek gave a grim smile as he thought of this; he knew it was more than a possibility, it was a fact, it was the goal he and his liebchen had been steering the Empire towards for years.

They had never had any intention of flexing their might but, equally, weren't prepared to be in a position were they could barely scrape through a conflict. The close-fought fight at the Tesla cannon and the immense cost of that had convinced the two of them to always be sure of their ground. They were inextricably bound in this conviction; it was the hallmark of the Hohenberg-Sharp Dynasty: Alek quartermastered a continual development campaign while Deryn spearheaded the movement; attending test voyages, observing and refining. Alek hated that she put herself at risk in this way but he had never been able to deny her the very qualities that had appealed to him from the first; she might have been retired from active service but she'd never be retired from activity so long as she was alive.

But she no longer was !

She'd been brought down and executed on the Italian borders. Alex felt as if he'd died too. War, it was always war, tearing his life apart. Enough of being the Emperor; he was a Prince too and the Powers would soon know the price of killing his princess. They had their second world war ... he would give them a third.


End file.
